RAFAH — For Khadra Jomma, the necklace is priceless. She inherited it from her late mother, and she never imagined that someday she would sell it.
But as Israel’s war on Gaza entered its sixth month, the woman, who is in her 40s, has no other option after her family ran out of money. She sold the necklace to get food and shelter to feed her family among soaring prices in the war-wrecked strip.
For the latest news & views from every corner of the world, Worldcrunch Today is the only truly international newsletter. Sign up here.
She waited at a jewelry store in Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah to sell her necklace. She was not alone. Many women joined the line outside the store in central Rafah.
Jomma and her husband were displaced from Gaza city after Israel’s military bombed their home and killed her nephews. They moved to Rafah’s Mawasi area where they built a nylon tent. It cost them $500.
The war displaced some 80% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, more than half of them crammed into the far south around Rafah — many living in tents or schools that have been turned into shelters. The city has become the latest destination for well over 1 million displaced, hungry and traumatized people crammed into a small sliver of land.
The Israeli blockade of food, water, fuel, and essential medicines and supplies is inflicting immense suffering on Palestinians. The population also lacks access to electricity and 100% of Gaza people are facing crisis levels of food insecurity, according to the International Rescue Committee.
The United Nations has already warned that more than half a million Palestinians in Gaza are facing famine-like conditions as a result of the war.
Israel declared war on Oct. 7, after Hamas militants attacked southern Israel, killing 1,200 and taking about 250 hostage. More than 31,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 70,000 wounded in Israel’s war on Hamas since then, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
“Exploitation”
Jomma’s life was turned upside down. They don’t have blankets in the tent. They are expensive in Rafah. A blanket now costs , up from before the war, she said.
As the war continued and with no source of income, Jomma began thinking of selling valuable possessions that they had brought with them from Gaza City.
The necklace was the most valuable.
At the jewelry store, she found that prices have dropped compared to pre-war prices. A gram of gold is sold at 37 Jordanian dinars (the official currency in Gaza), compared to 40 dinars before the war, she said.
“Exploitation,” she said of the traders. The absence of any control on the markets “left the field open for war merchants to exploit citizens,” she added.
Inside another jewelry store in central Rafah, Buthaina Abuel-Khair, a 45-year-old displaced woman, joined a group of women all selling their jewelry to feed their families.
She also found no other option amid the lack of humanitarian aid and the soaring prices of basic foodstuffs like flour, which reached 0 for a package. She sold her ring and purchased flour, oil and water to cover the basic needs of her starved family “for four days only,” she said.
Flourishing market
Moatasem Alaa El-Din, who owns a jewelry store in Rafah, said the gold market has flourished significantly with the arrival of thousands of displaced people from northern Gaza and the southern city of Khan Younis.
“We receive hundreds of women every day, the majority of whom are displaced women who want to sell their jewelry to buy food and drinking water,” he said.
He attributed the decline in the purchase price of gold to the high supply, denying that there is any exploitation.
He said that there are women who sell large quantities of gold — up to one kilogram in some cases. “They need money to cope with life as displaced and with the relentless war,” he said.
The gold market has significantly boomed in recent months due to people’s need for money to cover their needs, said Abdullah Odeh, an official in the Syndicate of Goldsmiths and Precious Metals Traders.
“Gold stores are crowded with dozens of women wanting to sell their jewelry, a movement that the market has not witnessed for years,” he said.
